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NZ's longest lags: New Zealand inmates who have spent the most time behind bars revealed

11 Sep, 2018 8:41pm

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Dean Wickliffe, one of New Zealand's most high-profile criminals and prison escapee talks about his life behind bars. He is the only person to have escaped Paremoremo maximum security prison twice and he was New Zealand's longest-serving prisoner. / Brett Phibbs

The men are in prison for a plethora of offending including murder, sex crimes, manslaughter and bank robbery.

One of the men has permanent name suppression so cannot be identified, but the rest have lengthy criminal histories and many will be well known to most New Zealanders.

1 Alfred Thomas Vincent

Days behind bars 18,132

Vincent is New Zealand's longest-serving prisoner.

The Christchurch man was one of the first people to be sentenced to preventive detention after he was convicted in 1968 of performing indecencies on five boys aged 12-14, including brothers, over about a year.

His raft of convictions include robbery, burglary, theft, drug offending and manslaughter.

Wickliffe's longest and most serious lag started in 1972 after he killed Paul Miet during the robbery of a jewellery store in Wellington.

He is also the only man to have escaped from the country's toughest prison twice.

In an exclusive interview with the Herald during his short parole stint last year, Wickliffe revealed his fractious and traumatic childhood led him down the dark path of crime and the destruction of himself and others.

Dean Wickliffe, one of New Zealand's most high-profile criminals and prison escapee talks about his life behind bars. He is the only person to have escaped Paremoremo maximum security prison twice and he was New Zealand's longest-serving prisoner. / Brett Phibbs

The first crime Wickliffe ever committed was alongside a cousin, who was a couple of years older.

They broke into a warehouse where Wickliffe had been working and pinched £350 - the equivalent of an average yearly wage at the time - and fled to Auckland.

The pair enjoyed the spoils of their crime, the freedom it gave them to have money for once, to be able to buy food and all of the other things young lads want in life.

After three months the cash was all spent, but by then Wickliffe was "hooked on the lifestyle".

6 Roberto Conchie Harris

Days behind bars 12,414

Harris is best known for being Witness C - a jailhouse snitch who gave crucial evidence that sealed the fate of David Tamihere.

Tamihere spent two decades in prison for the murders of Swedish backpackers Sven Urban Höglin, 23, and his fiancée Heidi Birgitta Paakkonen, 21, which he has always denied committing.